Putting Up a Front
by Cath4
Summary: It's hard to face the reality of a problem. You can't always hide and put up a front.
1. Just Another School

_Disclaimer: I do not own Higher Ground or the characters in Higher Ground. If there is anyone in this story you don't recognize they are mine. Purely from my imagination. _

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Chapter 1-

"Full name?"

"Alicia Lyn Ashmoore."

"Age?"

"16."

We went through this whole little survey type thing for a full 15 minutes. They really wanted to know everything about me. When I say everything, I mean everything. The littlest thing that I normally didn't even think about they wanted to know. Even my mother's maiden name. I found the whole thing dull and useless. I wasn't going to be there long enough for them to get to know me . . . just like all the other places.

We walked out of the office and into 'the great outdoors'- or so I've been told. There was way too much fresh air. What I wouldn't give to be sitting in my basement with a few friends smoking and hanging out. Now that was totally out of the question. My friend's were miles away and I was stuck up on this awful mountain. What could be worse?

Then I met my roommates. One was too perky, one was too goth, one was too depressed, and the other was . . . well, normal. Depending on your definition of normal, that is. We were all supposed to live in this little cabin. There were two rooms- the bedroom and the bathroom. Needless to say, it soon became apparent we'd all be doing everything together. What a joy.

I was finally settling in (I had everything unpacked and I was resting on my bed) when our 'counselor' Sophie came in. I don't mean counselor like a camp. I mean counselor like a loser who thinks they're going to help you with your problems- or what they think your problems are- but in reality they're only there to make sure you do what they want you to do. In other words, she was our slave driver.

Anyway, she came in and told us it was time for dinner and right after we had group. Peter Scarbrow- the guy in charge of Horizon- had explained what group was to me earlier. It was where we all sat around and talked about our 'problems' and feelings and crap. So we all went down to the dining room and ate dinner. It was more disgusting then cafeteria food. I barely ate anything. But then again I hardly ever eat anything.

After dinner we went into the next room for group. I thought it was going to be bad. I figured since I was the new kid everyone would either a.) completely ignore me or b.) ask me way too many questions about things I didn't want to talk about. I was hoping for a. But what awaited me was not like anything I could have imagined. We were all sitting on couches (all the Cliffhangers- the girls in my cabin and these three guys Scott, Ezra, and Auggie) while Peter stood in front of us lecturing us about control and randomly asking us questions. He asked the question, "What controls you?" and wanted each of us to say one thing that controls us.

Everyone answered with things like, "fear", or "drugs". Stuff like that. Then it was my turn. I wasn't about to divulge anything personal to these people so I simply said, "You". I don't know if you can figure out what happened next but Peter wasn't too happy about my answer. Even though I thought it was a good answer since I told the truth. He was controlling me.

Well soon after my answer group was over for the day. Lucky for me, though, I'd get to join in again the next night. And Peter didn't waste any time informing me of this. I just smiled and told him I loved group and couldn't wait until tomorrow night.

On my way back to my cabin one of the girls, Shelby, started walking with me. "I wouldn't get on Peter's bad side if I were you."

"Oh? And why not?"

Shelby stopped and looked at me with a smile on her face. I stopped too and she said, "Because. If Peter doesn't like you he'll bug you even more." We started walking again, "He'll try to be your best friend because he knows you just want him to leave you alone."

"Yeah well- I'm not planning on staying here long enough for friends of any kind. Least of all Peter Scarbrow." With that I walked faster up the trail leaving Shelby watching me from behind.

Knowing I was leaving this place in a few weeks left me in a semi good mood. That is until I walked into my cabin. I found Daisy, Katherine, and Juliet all in the bathroom when I went in to take a shower. There was one shower in the room so I chose to wait until they were all done. In the mean time I sat down on the toilet and watched Daisy brush her hair. I never understood why girls brush their hair before bed. What's the point? It's just going to get messed up anyway.

Finally when they were out of the room I closed the door and went to lock it only to find that it didn't have a lock. "Oh great." I muttered to myself. I turned the shower on and hoped that Shelby wouldn't walk in. She didn't and once I was dressed and in the bedroom I found out why.

The three girls were all huddled around a window watching something. I walked over to them (since they were right next to my bed) and said, "Whatchya staring at?"

"Shelby and Scott." Katherine said. I peered out the window and saw Shelby and Scott sitting on a bench somewhat far away. Shelby was resting her head on Scott's shoulder. They were apparently talking.

"Wow . . . I didn't know they were together."

"She's so obnoxious." Juliet said walking away from the window. "She always gets what she wants and then flaunts it in everyone else's face."

Daisy followed Juliet and sat on her bed directly across from Juliet. "You're just jealous because he chose her over you."

"Come on you guys." Katherine said turning to face them. "Stop fighting."

"We weren't fighting, Kat." Juliet said.

Katherine sat down on the bed next to mine, "Well you were about to. Let's just forget about Shelby and try and get some sleep."

Juliet was quick to say sarcastically, "That won't be hard to do." Kat shot her a quick glare and got into bed. Everyone else followed her example but I stayed at the window. It was right next to Daisy's bed so she was the first to tell me to get into bed. The others told me soon after to get into bed but I just ignored them. I was interested in watching Scott and Shelby. They were both totally screwed up but somehow they made it work. "Too bad everything else in life isn't like that." I thought to myself. Then, to everyone's great enjoyment, I got into bed and turned out my light.


	2. Crash and Burn

Chapter 2:

Peter called me into his office right after breakfast. I knew what was coming. He wanted to talk to me about what was expected of me. What my personal goals were and what they should be. How I was supposed to treat others and myself. All the boring crap I'd heard at every other "school". More like Institute if you asked me. When I got in Peter's office I stood by the door. It was a small rebellion but I pleasant one. It gave me a sense of control.

But, of course, that didn't last for long. Peter looked up at me and asked, "Why don't you sit down?"

"That's all right. I'm good." I told him crossing my arms over my stomach.

Peter shrugged, "Fine by me. But this might take a while." I rolled my eyes. He was making this difficult. But that was okay. I liked a challenge. "I just wanted to talk about why you're here." That was a little bit of a surprise. No one had ever talked about that on my second day at a new school. Oh well. He caught me off guard but I knew how to deal with that. "Now, I know there has been some substance abuse but is there anything else I might need to know about?"

"I don't know." I mumbled.

Peter didn't seem like he cared much about the way I was treating him. I did and didn't like that. I wanted to make his life as much a living hell as mine was. And although I wasn't being very straightforward right then I wasn't about to step it up a notch. Not yet. I wanted to make him think this was all I was. A girl with an attempted attitude. Not the freak that I truly was. "Okay," he continued, "Do you want to talk about any of the reasons you're here? Maybe why you took drugs?"

Like I was about to divulge to him anything I felt or why I did the things I did. This guy needed a reality check if he thought I was about to do that. "No," I said politely, "that's okay. But thank you for the offer."

Peter smiled at me. "Alright, you can go to your classes. I'm sure one of the other Cliffhangers will be willing to show you where to go."

I turned and left the room. About halfway down the hallway to the outside door I stopped and leaned against the wall. I had to think. I had to come up with a plan. A fast way to get me out of there. Peter wasn't flinching. There was a guy like that at one of the other school's I had gone to. I didn't have to deal with him, though, because he left the school soon after I got there. This was new territory for me but I wasn't about to give up. It just made me want to fight harder.

I soon found out that everything about Horizon was about finding the deeper meaning and finding yourself. Find and be found as my last school had said. I think ti was their motto but I didn't care enough to find out. In my Social Studied class they had us try to find the reasoning behind Adolph Hitler killing Jewish people. Why would you do that in history class? That would be more psychology. And even then who would do that? Self help school's that who.

Juliet informed me after classes that because it was Friday we were supposed to check the bulletin board to see what chores we would have for the following week. Lucky us. I sullenly followed her to the bulletin board where she went down the list to Cliffhangers. Apparently Juliet was going to be working in the kitchen and lucky me got to do laundry with Auggie. "Auggie's a really fun guy to work with. You'll have fun."

"Doing other people's laundry? Give me a break." I said bitterly. I was being mean to Juliet unfairly. I had my reasons for being mad but none of them had anything to do with Juliet.

Juliet asked me, "What's up with you? I've seen all these new kids come in all mean and everything but what did I do to you? I'm just trying to be nice."

"Well don't. Don't be nice to me. The whole nice thing is so fake anyway. Everyone can tell you're just putting up a front."

"Oh, look who's talking. All you do is piss everyone off because you're so angry even though all your anger is because of you and not the people you're angry at."

I rolled my eyes. "Like you know anything about me. I've been here not even a day and already you know what I do and I why I do it?"

"Kids like you come in here all the time. I know your type."

I crossed my arms, "So now I'm a type. Ever stop to think that everyone is different? Everyone has different problems." Juliet had nothing to say to that. She just walked away. I rolled my eyes and walked up into the rec room. Juliet needed to stop focusing on other people and start focusing on herself. She seemed to need way more help then I could ever need.

I sat down on one of the many couches and just sat there doing nothing. I stared at other kids doing who knows what and wished so bad that I could be alone in my bedroom. I wished that I could be myself and not have people tell me what I was doing was wrong. If I wanted to crash and burn why wouldn't anyone let me? It's not like people actually cared about me. I was just another screwed up kid to everyone. Someone passed from one person to another so my parents wouldn't have to deal with me. I was sick of it but there was no way to get out of it. Until I was 18 I was a "ward of the state" as everyone said. "Well screw them" I thought to myself. 


	3. Planning

Chapter 3: 

The next morning was Saturday. What do you do on the weekends at an outdoor school for troubled teens? Apparently Peter liked to take everyone on little "adventures". Today we had the pleasure of climbing a rock wall in the woods. I sat down near the back of the group and watched as each of the kids took their turn. Most of them would get scared around the middle and ask if they could come down. Peter said no to most of them. We all had to get to the top. Everyone ahead of me went and then it was my turn. I had done all sorts of these things at different schools across the country. I knew what I was doing. But I hadn't done anything very physical in 6 months. I didn't know how hard this would be.

I started climbing. It wasn't as hard as it could have been. I got to the middle in only a few minutes. But after the middle the hand and foot holds got further apart. I was struggling to reach each one. I reached my hand up and grabbed onto a handhold. My hand was getting slippery and it fell from the hold when I pulled my leg up. My right hand and foot were the only things keeping me onto the wall. Peter called up to me with worry in his voice (can't loose a student on a rock wall), "Alicia, you okay?"

I didn't answer I was too focused on grabbing that handhold. I spun myself over so I was flat against the wall. I moved my foot around for the foothold but I couldn't find it. I was starting to get scared. I needed to find that foothold! It was then that my right hand started slipping. "Dammit" I whispered. My hand kept slipping and my foot kept moving to find the foothold. I could hear everyone below me talking and I knew everyone's eyes were on me. I moved my foot to the left and I felt something. I put my foot on it and tried to put my right hand back on the handhold. It seemed like forever that I was nearing my death. But it was probably only about a minute or two. Peter didn't make me go all the way to the top. After I got myself back on the wall he said I could come down. Slowly I made my way back down.

At the bottom everyone gathered around me and started asking me questions. I was sick of being around all of them and I just walked away. Peter came over to me and said, "We should probably get you into the infirmary to make sure you're okay."

"I'm fine." I said quietly but firmly.

Peter sighed, "You could very possibly have gotten seriously injured up there you're going to get checked out."

"I'm fine." I repeated.

"Meet me in my office at 5:00 tonight." Peter told me. He walked back to the other kids and I sat down on a rock.

"Great." I thought to myself. "You almost die and now you get spend quality time with Peter Scarbrow. Good going, Alicia."

By the time we got back to school it was going on 4:00. I took a shower and laid on my bed for a few minutes. I had to leave for my meeting with Peter in about 15 minutes. All the girls were sitting on their beds talking about the rock climbing adventure. "So what really happened up there?" Shelby asked me. "I mean, why did you almost fall?"

I stood up from my bed and walked out the door. I didn't feel like listening to them talk about how scary it was and how they wanted to get better at climbing. I slowly made my way down the hill to the main campus. I didn't feel like seeing Peter yet so I walked towards the woods. When I was little I used to love the woods. My grandmother used to take me for walks in the woods behind her house. When I would sleep over my grandfather would set up a tent in the backyard and I would sleep out there. When I would come into the house the next morning the seat on the deck was always warm from where my grandpa had slept that night.

I felt a dull ache in my chest when I thought of grandma and grandpa. When I was 10 I wasn't allowed to see them anymore. Not even when my grandpa went into the hospital the next year because of cancer. I wasn't allowed to go to his funeral and I wasn't allowed to call my grandma and tell her how much I missed her and grandpa and how much I wished I could have said goodbye.

But that was all in the past. So many things had happened between then and being at Horizon that it didn't seem to matter anymore. I checked my watch. 5:20. I started making my way back to the school. When I was about 5 yards away from the school I saw Sophie looking for something. "Whatchya looking for?" I asked her.

She looked at me like she was really mad but she was being nice for me. "You. Where have you been? Peter and I have been looking for you for 10 minutes."

"Geez, I just took a walk. Don't freak out." I told her.

Sophie put her hand on my shoulder and sort of pushed me towards the school. "You know the rules. You're not allowed to go into the woods without permission. Besides you were supposed to be in Peter's office 20 minutes ago."

"So what's the big deal? I'm a little late." I said shrugging her hand off my shoulder.

Sophie rolled her eyes. She pulled a walkie talkie out of her pocket and told Peter that she found me and we'd be in his office. Five minutes later I was sitting with Peter in his office and boy was he mad. "Why did you go into the woods when number one you know you're not allowed to and number two you knew you had to meet me at 5?" I just shrugged. "Okay, fine. You don't have to tell me." Peter said. "But don't expect to just get a warning. You've been to enough school's just like Horizon to know actions like these are not condoned. You're going to be helping Sophie in the main office every day for a month."

"Oh, that's brilliant." I muttered. Real tough work. Like no one had made me do that before. Last time I actually found it fun. I got to find out about other students and people who were coming to the school.

Peter was still really mad but I could tell he didn't want to get into everything with me. He sat down and said, "Now. The reason I called you in here in the first place. I understand you're new here. But I'm not going to treat you like a new student. You already know the ropes so I'm letting your easy week go. I'd really like it if you would just cooperate with me."

"Why? What's the point?"

"The point is this is your last option. Your parents don't know what else to do with you so this is your last resort."

I snorted, "Like my parents seriously care. They don't give a shit about me. When it comes to me it's out of sight out of mind for them."

"Your parents are just trying to help you. That's what we're all doing."

"I didn't ask for your help or my parents or anyone's. If my parents really were trying to help me they would bring me home. Not ship me off from one school to the next without even a letter or a phone call."

Peter seemed to soften when I said that. I knew I was screwing up letting him know anything. Even something that seemed so little. But I knew once he knew about my parents not caring he would start to dig deeper and things would just get worse. He would think I was cracking. I wasn't. I was as far from that as possible. "Look-" he said, "I know it's tough going from one place to another like that but you've got to let me help."

"Oh yeah? And why's that?" I asked.

Peter looked me square in the eye. "Because if you don't make the slightest bit of headway you're going to juvy."


	4. Tell Me Honestly

Chapter 4: 

I looked at Peter incredulously. What was he talking about, juvy? I couldn't go to juvenile hall. I hadn't really been busted for anything for weeks. This was my punishment. I thought. "What do you mean?" I asked Peter trying not to show my fear.

Peter looked at me in a somewhat sympathetic way- for a guy who probably hated my guts right then- "I mean when you got caught with the pot and you got sent here- it was just temporary. The judge wanted you to go to juvenile hall for a year. But your parents lawyer got it so you could come here. But if you screwed up once you'd get sent to juvy." I sat there dumbfounded. I couldn't go to jail. I couldn't. "I'm sorry Alicia but that's the way it is. Maybe now you'll try to cooperate?"

This was my worst nightmare. Having to tell someone every horrible thing I had done. Why my parents hated me so much. Why I was the way I was. I weighed out my choices. Tell Peter what he wanted to know or spend the next year of my life in prison. I chose the latter. "Fine. What do you want to know?"

"Why have you been doing drugs?" Peter asked me.

I looked down at my shoes and closed my eyes. "Great. Just jump right in there." I said. Peter looked at me and I knew I was pushing it. I sighed, "Because I can escape."

"Escape what?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Everything. My parents, pain, life in general."

"Alicia, avoiding life isn't going to help. You need to face your problems not hide from them." Peter told me. I didn't know what to do or say. I had never been in this situation before. I never let anyone know anything and it was new territory. I hated not being in control. Peter had been here before, though, and he knew exactly what to do. "What pain are you escaping from?"

I sat in that chair in Peter's office almost crying remembering everything. Things I hadn't thought about in so long. The only times I did think about it was when I was too high to really think clearly. "Everything. Everything I've done to everyone." I felt a tear roll down my cheek and I quickly wiped it away. I remembered where I was and what was happening and suddenly I got mad. "There I made some headway. Now I won't go to juvy. Can I leave now?"

"No." Peter said firmly. "Telling me things and starting to change are two totally different things."

"Then how do I start changing?" I asked.

Peter stared at me for a minute. "By wanting to." He stopped for a minute and then grabbed some papers. "You can go eat dinner. You have group afterwards. I want to see you there."

"Fine." I muttered getting up and leaving his office. What was happening to me? I was telling him things. He knew stuff. He knew why I did the drugs. Sure, not completely and not everything but he knew stuff. And sooner or later I was going to have to tell him everything. It was either that or jail. Maybe jail wouldn't be so bad. I shook my head at the thought. I had friends who went to juvy. They told me stories about how the guards treated them like dirt and didn't care what happened to you. They didn't treat you like an individual. And then when you got out you usually had a parole officer who didn't treat you any better. One screw up and they were more then happy to send your sorry ass back to jail. Looking at it that way Horizon seemed a million times better then juvy.

When I got to the dining room I grabbed some food and sat in a corner. I couldn't believe I'd only been at Horizon for two days and already this crap was being thrown at me. Peter was right when he said I was skipping my easy week. As I was thinking this and staring out the window Shelby dropped her tray on the table and sat down with it. The Cliffhangers were all with her. "I told you not to mess with Peter." she said.

"Whatever." I grumbled.

Shelby apparently didn't get the hint that I didn't want to talk to her because she kept talking. "So- what did Peter want?"

"Nothing." I told her.

Auggie joined the conversation. "How bad did you get it for running?"

I looked at him and raised an eyebrow. '"I didn't run." I told him. "I went for a walk."

"And accidentally lost track of time?" Juliet asked.

I gave her an evil look. "No, I knew what time it was."

"So you were going to blow off Peter?" Shelby asked.

"No. I was going to be late. That's all. Don't you guys have anything better to do then to bug me?"

Juliet smiled at me. "Not really." she said. I rolled my eyes and went back to moving around the food on my plate. Occasionally I would look out the window and watch the leaves blowing around.

It made me remember when I was with my grandparents in their backyard and my grandpa was raking leaves. He would get a big pile put together and tell me to go for it and I would jump in. The smell of those leaves was both disgusting and incredible. Then we would go inside and my grandma would have fresh apple cider and ginger snaps waiting for us. That seemed like so long ago. I wanted to go back to that time when nothing mattered except the size of that pile of leaves.

Dinner was ending and everyone was gathering in the rec room for group. Peter stood at the front of the room handing out pieces of paper to everyone that entered the room. I didn't look at mine until after I was sitting on a chair by myself. It was a survey type thing with all these questions we were supposed to answer. Questions about ourselves.

"You're probably wondering why I gave you guys these questionnaires." he said. I wanted to say not really but I bit my tongue. "I want you guys to answer these tonight and give them back to me tomorrow night at group. I want you to answer them truthfully. No one will see them but me." We were all looking at our papers seeing what horrible things we were going to have to fess up to. It didn't look too bad. Things Peter probably already knew about us. "But for tonight we're going to talk about anger. What makes you angry. Why it makes you angry and how to deal with that anger. How many of you have ever been angry?" Everyone raised their hands. "Okay, how many of you have done something destructive with that anger?" Again, we all raised our hands. "Now, how many of you have ever done anything productive with that anger?" Nobody raised their hands. Peter nodded and smiled. "One of the things we want you guys to learn while you're here is to make something good come from something bad."

"What if we're too angry to want to make something good from something bad?" Auggie asked.

Peter pointed at Auggie while pacing the room in that way teacher's have. "That has to do with control. We talked about control a few days ago. Right now I want you guys to recognize your anger..." The whole group session was really dull and I found myself completely zoning out. After group I went up to my dorm while all the girls were somewhere hanging out together. I wanted to fill the stupid questionnaire out while I was alone.

I was right. The whole thing was stuff Peter must have known from looking through our folders. I actually did answer honestly for most of the questions. But the last one. The last one got me.

_Do you feel you need to do drugs/physically harm yourself/etc to be yourself?_

I took a minute before answering. Did I? This was the first time I ever truly thought about what I did and why I did it. I didn't have an answer right away. But it came to me. And I did answer honestly.

_I don't know_.

If it wasn't a good enough answer for Peter then sucks for him. But it was all I had.


End file.
